As previously speculated by many SEO insiders including Search Engine Land, Google today announced the launch of Google Compare for Auto Insurance in the United States.

Google Compare will show up to 14 sponsored results from insurance providers, including rate quotes. It is expected that this number will increase as Google adds more providers to the service. A snippet describing usage benefits for providers explains the advantages of the service:

You can highlight what makes your business unique, whether that’s an “A” rating in customer service or better discounts for safe drivers. And when users adjust their deductible or add additional cars to their quote, you can show updated pricing that matches their needs.

From those sponsored listings, users can then proceed to purchase coverage online, or via phone. The program will initially cover drivers in California, and will roll out to more states including more features including user reviews, ratings, and local representative information in the coming months.

Google: Lead Generator?

Eschewing the normal PPC ad facilitation revenue model, Google is acting as a qualified lead generator, with pricing based on a CPA (cost-per-acquisition) model instead of a traditional clickthrough model.

Despite these changes, Google has clarified that traditional organic rankings will not be affected by the inclusion of sponsored elements in SERPs.

Auto Insurance, at Long Last

Google has operated a similar Auto Insurance quote acquisition program in the UK since 2012 (As shown in the featured photo for this article.) There is analyst speculation that Google may even move to provide and sell their own insurance products through this new vertical.

Auto insurance is only the latest of many retail verticals Google has seen fit to conquer in recent years, joining shopping, hotel accommodations, and flights in an ever-growing list. Google Compare Auto Insurance Services, Inc. has been approved to do business in over 25 states, with more surely to come.

Hello friends and readers! As we dive deeper into 2015, I wanted to take a few moments to compile together some of the best SEO and Organic Search related articles that we’ve posted here on Indexed Marketing in the last year. We’ve covered great topics, from Brand Authority to Verifying your Pinterest Account, and today I’d like to share some of my favorites with you!

SEO and Organic Search Mechanics

These articles cover the mechanical aspect of SEO, from metadata formatting to page speed optimizations, and are considered the ‘under the hood’ changes that affect your site performance in organic search. Many SEOs would agree that on-page mechanics are often the first actionable item with any website (after research and planning, of course!)

Starting off with HTTPS and the importance secure sites can have on your organic search performance. HTTPS is an interesting topic that many people easily forget about when assessing all of the details of a site that can have a search impact. Brush up on this HTTPS info to keep your site on top!

Configuring Google Webmaster Tools not only tells Google that you are the legitimate owner of your website, it also gives you helpful alerts and heads-up info when something is going wrong on your site. This free tool is used by most every webmaster today, and though Yahoo and Bing have comparable tools for their own search engines, the lion’s share of traffic obviously comes from Google (for US search queries, anyhow)

SEO Jobs/SEO In the Workplace

Becoming a wizard of SEO can give you a skillset that will help you stand out in your workplace. Because SEO is still largely understood by most, being able to prove technical proficiency in even the most basic of SEO disciplines may give you the competing edge over your competition. Check out these articles for more helpful info on SEO in the workplace:

By devoting a small amount of time to learning a new technical skill, or brushing up on a skill you already have, you can give yourself a massive edge over your professional competition. Whether it’s by learning a software discipline like Microsoft Excel or Adobe Photoshop, or just simply working to improve your professional writing skills, self-improvement pays off not only in the office, but in your personal life as well.

Keeping Your Website Indexed with Google Webmaster Tools

Have you ever wondered how exactly Kayak.com shows up in Google when you search for ‘cheap travel’? There are a lot of factors that contribute to how your website is displayed in search results, but there is one common factor that you absolutely MUST have to ensure any amount of success in organic search: Verification of your site through Google Webmaster Tools.

What is it, and Why should I care?

Webmaster Tools allows you to verify that you are the owner of a given website, and it also allows you to assist Google in finding the important content on your website using sitemaps. This is important for a multitude of reasons:

By proving ownership of your site, Google then knows that your website is a real website, owned by a real live person, who isn’t using the site to distribute malware, phish for customer information, or any other malicious activities. By doing this, you immediately catapult yourself above all of the grey-water, ‘shady’ websites of the internet (a staggering percentage of the internet is made up of these malicious or otherwise ‘low quality’ sites.

By creating and submitting a sitemap, Google knows exactly where the important content on your website lives, and exactly how to direct users towards the information they’re looking for. The name sitemap is quite literal; it gives the internet a map, or directory, of your site that can be used to find exactly what a user is looking for, the first time they try.

The above video will show you step-by-step how to configure Google Webmaster Tools for your site. The steps are fairly simple, especially if you already have Google Analytics set up. Sound off in the comments if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions!

Later this week, we’ll be following up with a video that walks you through the configuration steps for Bing Webmaster tools!

Hey everyone, and happy Monday! I wanted to share some short reminder tips on how to keep your blog SEO friendly, both when maintaining existing content, and when creating and curating new content! Sound off in the comments and let me know if you have any other great tips that help keep your blog in tip-top shape!

1. Responsive Design:

You want your blog to respond and conform to any / all devices that the user may be using. This creates just one URL, causing any inbound links to only link to one domain rather than multiple domains. This helps boost your Google ranking, in turn boosting your SEO ranking.

2. Create content that’s relevant to your keywords. Below are a few tips to follow when writing:

Write your content for people, not so much for what you think a search bot would like. It should be natural and captivating.

Write something unique that your readers won’t be able to find anywhere else on the web.

3. Link Internally:

Linking internally to your blog or event to the HB website helps show the validity and relevancy of your blog content.

4. Consider the “scanners”

Most people, when browsing blogs or reading posts tend to skim through. Make it easy for users to read:

use shorter sentences

use bullet points & lists

use relevant images.

5. Font size matters

The larger the text on the page, the more importance is placed on it by Google. When crating headers and sub-headers, make sure to use your primary and secondary keywords.

6. Images:

A good image can help strengthen your content and lower your bounce rate. Make sure you save the image files as keywords rather than “image384773”.

7. Share, share, share!

Once all of your blog content is optimized and ready, make sure to share it on all of your social media channels.

After lagging behind Android for years in terms of native app development for Google Analytics, Google has finally released Google Analytics for iOS. The first party Google Analytics app comes with support for some of the best features of Analytics, including Real Time traffic view, secondary factor drilldown, and beautiful graphic-based display of information. The Google Analytics app is available for devices running iOS 6.0 and up, and is optimized for iPhone 5/5s and iPad.

Features at a Glance:

Tapping the bar icon in the upper left corner opens the options that are available in the left hand menu in the web version of Analytics. Users can choose to drill into Real-Time, Audience, Acquisition, Behavior and Conversions.

Segment filtering is also easy, by tapping the circle with a plus sign icon in the upper right corner. When a segment is selected, the icon turns orange. You cannot use custom segments in the app or do anything custom at all really. This is just the basics, but it’s clean and easy to use.

After an initial beta testing period for a new International Targeting feature, Google has officially announced its inclusion into the Webmaster Tools suite, allowing for href-lang tag markup to be used to denote which version of a page should be served for a given locality. Because of the relative low adoption of href language tags up until now, implementation and syntax is often incorrect when using these tags.

International Targeting Error Reporting

Webmaster Tools can now help to detect some of these syntax errors, and help you to display the proper version of a given page for every viewer. The built-in reporting helps identify these common issues:

Missing return links: annotations must be confirmed from the pages they are pointing to. If page A links to page B, page B must link back to page A, otherwise the annotations may not be interpreted correctly. For each error of this kind Google may report where and when Google detected them, as well as where the return link is expected to be.

Incorrect hreflang values: The value of the hreflang attribute must either be a language code in ISO 639-1 format such as “es”, or a combination of language and country code such as “es-AR”, where the country code is in ISO 3166-1 Alpha 2 format. In case Google indexing systems detect language or country codes that are not in these formats, Google will provide example URLs to help you fix them.

If you’ve been feeling like it’s been too long since a major version release of WordPress, Automattic has answered your prayers with the beta release of WordPress 4.0. As with any beta product, Automattic urges you to use a staging or test environment while trying out WordPress 4.0, as this release is nowhere near stable enough for everyday production server use. If you’re a little queazy about using preproduction builds, don’t fret! The full initial release of 4.0 is slated for some time next month. To get your blogging glands salivating, here’s a list of some of the new features you can expect to see in WordPress 4.0:

Preview Embedded URLs

WordPress 4.0 Beta allows for previews of embedding via URLs in the visual editor and the “Insert from URL” tab in the media modal. Try pasting a URL, such as a YouTube video, onto its own line in the visual editor and see a live preview of what it will look like.

Media Library Grid View

The Media Library now has a “grid” view in addition to the existing list view. Clicking on an item takes you into a modal where you can see a larger preview and edit information about that attachment, and you can navigate between items right from the modal without closing it.

Improved Plugin Install Experience

WordPress is freshening up the plugin install experience. When searching for plugins and viewing details, you’ll see some early visual changes as well as more information.

Other Changes

The editor intelligently resizes and its top and bottom bars pin when needed.

Some improvements to how your keyboard and cursor interact with TinyMCE views such as the gallery preview.

Google Shopping listings have been updated yet again, in lockstep with Panda 4.0, and as a result there are some guideline changes when building new product feeds that take advantage of enhanced tagging ability, sorting and grouping by product performance, and more! Check out the highlights below:

Best Practices for an Optimized Shopping Campaign Feed

Ensure “product data is complete, fresh and accurate”

Upload data regularly to keep information current

Once a day, or depending on changes, schedule frequent uploads

Feeds should be kept updated to reflect any new price changes and availability

Though SEO and Social Media both pertain to hugely different aspects of any online presence, their philosophies and core goals often go hand in hand. When cultivating an SEO/Organic Search strategy, you should always have your Social Media goals and expectations in mind when shaping your decisions.

The infographic below from Orbit Media Solutions gives you 7 differences between social media marketing and SEO, while also demonstrating why they complement and depend on each other in so many ways.

As a longtime blogger, I know from experience how difficult it can be to maintain a regular schedule of fresh, new content. As other priorities in life come up, blog entries can fall by the wayside. But as any competent internet marketer will tell you, consistency is extremely important when building (and maintaining) a fanbase online. Ensuring that you are continually producing new and original blog content has the natural direct effect of increasing readership, generating new organic search traffic, which in turn increases organic SERP performance, and the cycle continues. Using these easy tips, you can help stave off lazy blogging, and ensure that you are posting fresh, new content every single day-no matter how small the content may seem.

Blogging is a Muscle. Flex It.

Like most hobbies, be it soccer, video games, playing guitar, etc., practice is the key to constantly improving. By simply going through the motions of creating a blog entry, you are exercising and challenging your brain to create something out of nothing. Don’t sell yourself short-writing of any kind is an amazing feat if you really think about it. The ability to take an idea, a thought, or a feeling, and convey it in a way that other people can understand and appreciate is a gift. Even if your entry for the day isn’t Pulitzer Prize winning writing, it’s writing nonetheless. And more importantly, it’s yours. Build a body of work, if for nothing else, but for your own practice and self-satisfaction.

You Don’t Have to Write a Novel.

Not every blog entry has to be a long-form, mind blowing expose on a hot topic. Sometimes, it’s okay to write a quick entry that may include nothing more than a few thoughts.

Industry Related News and Blogs are your Friend. Use Them!

If you can’t find something to write about, turn to the news. Read up on current events that pertain to your blog or your field of expertise. At the very least, you can come up with some compelling thoughts on an article or story you’ve read, and you can in turn share that content with your audience while still contributing something useful to the overall conversation.

Use Rich Media to ‘Beef Up’ Light Blog Content

If your writing is feeling a bit skimpy, use some rich media elements to add a bit of heft to your entry. Now, don’t use images and videos as a crutch to supplant less-than-awesome writing, but in a pinch, filling a little dead space with rich content is better than a blank, white page. Try to use complementary media, not just media that reinforces what has already been said. Find interviews from parties with counter-views to provide context and scope for a story or opinion you’ve written. Or perhaps find some file footage that provides some added illustration to get a point across. Rich media can be your friend, if you use it intelligently.

Now that we’ve covered a few basics of philosophy when it comes to consistent blogging, I’d like to show you an additional resource: my 30-minute framework for Social Media consistency. Maintaining your Social presence on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc., is an integral part of your content machine. After all, if you don’t have anywhere to share your content, what’s the use in building it?! If you follow this 30-minute Social Media and Blogging Regimen in conjunction with one another, you should see consistent, natural growth of your audience, content views, shares, and social media engagement! (Remember: If your content sucks, your results will too! I can’t make your content high-quality with the snap of my fingers, but I can help you leverage that quality content to squeeze the most growth from your effort.)

6 Minutes – Aggregate, Schedule, and Share your content. Compile between 2-5 posts to stagger throughout the day, between third party content and articles, and your own blog content as mentioned above. Utilize scheduling tools like HootSuite, SproutSocial, or Klout will allow you to queue content to be automatically posted at a set time.